My Lords, I welcome the input of my noble friends Lord Cope, Lord Deben and Lord Hodgson, on this deregulation issue. Clause 89 replaces the current annual return for companies with a new requirement for companies to confirm that the information held on the register of companies is up to date. Companies will no longer have to restate information if there has been no change. They will have more flexibility about when they confirm that their company information is up to date.
Charitable companies are currently required to file a separate annual return with the Charity Commission. Clause 89 does not change that position. The information required by the Charity Commission in its role as a charity regulator is not the same as that required by the Registrar of Companies. Therefore, the information required in the two returns differs. For example, a charity’s annual return to the Charity Commission contains financial information taken from the charity’s accounts and narrative information on the charity’s aims and activities. Charities with an income of more than £25,000 also need to enclose copies of their accounts with the annual return. That is not to say, of course, that nothing can be done to reduce the reporting burden on charities.
In December 2012, the Charity Commission began registering charities under a new legal form—the charitable incorporated organisation, or CIO. The aim of the CIO structure is to give charities the advantages of incorporation without all the administrative burdens associated with being a company. For example, CIOs do not need to register with Companies House but need send only an annual return to the Charity Commission. In 2013-14, the Charity Commission registered 1,331 CIOs. We expect the number of charities choosing this structure to increase in future. As the Government said in our response to the noble Lord’s review of the Charities Act, the Charity Commission has accepted his recommendation that we should continue work on creating a single reporting system for charitable companies.
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The noble Lord, Lord Cope, talked about deregulation. I understand that Companies House will meet the Charity Commission in March to explore this further and will give further detailed consideration to ways in which the implementation of the confirmation statement can be aligned with the Charity Commission’s requirements—for example, with a joint filing approach similar to that used by Companies House and HM Revenue & Customs. This would allow charitable companies to enter data once to satisfy the requirements of both Companies House and the Charity Commission, and it would reduce the administrative burdens on these companies. In addition, information provided by charities in their accounts could be made available to Companies House and the Charity Commission without the need for the charitable company to provide this information separately. I will ask the organisations to write jointly to the noble Lord after their meeting setting out how they will take this forward.
I am pleased to say that work is in progress on this matter. I hope that the noble Lord has found my explanation reassuring and, on that basis, will withdraw his amendment.